This is what happens when you’re left to your devices in a quiet bookstore, surrounded by millions of ideas– you get carried away with your own.

I have this ongoing fantasy about being the benign dictator of the U.S. I’m not advocating dictatorships in general, only my dictatorship. To catch the drift of my plan, see Part I.

Families:

All persons desiring to marry must pass an intensive, mandatory child-rearing class (whether or not they intend to have children). This class would include essential, practical instruction on rearing children from birth to college, physical and psychological care, in addition to anger management classes

when deemed necessary. At the end of the class a certificate would be issued– without this certificate no marriage license will be issued. For those who choose to have children without marrying, they would be required to take the same class before or immediately after the birth of their child. Upon completion they could retrieve the birth certificate and file for the social security number for that child. The point is: everyone raising children should have basic knowledge. No one should drive a car without a license and no one should raise children without some basic knowledge and techniques, which this class would provide. Free refresher courses would be offered every other year and support groups with child-care professionals would be provided upon request.

Corporations:

I now realize that in dealing with corporations I would actually need to be Dictator of the World if I expect to reform the pay scale of executives. So, okay, on this issue I dictate to the world. Here’s the deal. Executives’ pay, including all their compensations, would be limited to no more than 25% of their average employees’ pay. If all the corporations of the world had to abide by this law then there would be no question of needing to compete for the best executives by paying more. An added benefit would be the incentive to pay the workers more, because if the workers earn more it automatically increases executive pay.

No executive would get year-end bonuses unless their company performed profitably during the year. That seems so elementary but day after day we read about… well, you know what we read about.

And while I realize that these executives are very busy and important people, I believe that they are out of touch with the reality of the people who work for them and have no concept of the way an average person lives (like, in one house or apartment, not six scattered all over the world,) so to keep the executives and managers “in touch,” I’m ruling that they have to go to dinner at an employee’s home once a month. Employees are not required to host, but I believe they would want to in order to have the boss’s ear for one whole evening. I would imagine some ideas could be exchanged and a certain synergy created. It would help the executives to move beyond their moat mentality and perhaps open their eyes a bit.

Politics:

Lobbyists would be completely outlawed. Funding for elections would come from the government and each candidate would be given the exact same amount to spend, regardless of party affiliation. All television, radio and internet political ads would be abolished. Only print media could be circulated and thenonly informational background on that candidate and their position on the issues would be allowed in print. No mention of their opponents or allusions to their opponents would be allowed. If a candidate failed to adhere to this rule they would be barred from running. In this way the American people might actually be able to choose their representatives at the local, state and federal level, with some degree of intelligence. They would have to actually read about the candidates without any of the hype and smear campaigns. ( Don’t scream first amendment, I’m a Dictator.)

To make up for the loss of revenue to lobbyists I suggest they all become political pundits and start a reality show called “General Losers”.

To the ad agencies and other companies that will lose revenues because of the ban on political advertising, I’m sorry.

Health Care:

I just have six words for the health care plan I would put in place: Taiwan’s Health Care System. Duplicate it.

My mind is spinning with my new-found fantasy power. The one thing I can’t address is the Environment. Wish I had some solutions that a Dictator could carry out but we know what we need to do and most of us just can’t get there. Most likely I could go on for days, but I’ll leave it at this for now. What would you do if you were Dictator? I’d love to hear your fantasies.

Related

2 responses to “The Dictator in Me – Part II”

Yes, I like your dictator style. Especially agree with your ideas regarding families…just seems like good common sense. Just two more very small but important laws that I would ask you to put into place under your rule; # 1.) school uniforms required from kindergarten to 12th grade, please! and 2.) no one person may have more than 5 tattoos, period and while we’re at it , same with the piercings.

Donna: Whatever it takes to make you our dictator I’m enlisting. If your ideas were to rule, it would cut out 95% of the corruption in our government. ( Humans will always find a way for that 5%) Your compulsory child rearing classes would be a veritable revolution. It would result in fewer divorces to begin with, and probably keep a lot of couples from rushing headlong into marriage. O f course, it would reduce all kinds of harm inflicted upon children through ignorance . This, in turn, would result in a huge decrease in juvenile delinquency, drug & alcohol abuse, crime , etc. Who knows? Some teenagers might even like their parents……but now I’m going overboard.
Keep your brilliant ideas coming, Donna!!!

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Homage to the Women of Portrait of a Bookstore

Hidden Altar-
-tucked-
Where sprites bristle with Eve
and flow freely
No one considered
the ritual
no one thought it up-
out of book and prayer
twinned with time
came free spirits...
Tiny silken moth
fluttering by
accidentally brushes
the heart...
...light passes
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to lost Romeo
or Aristotle
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with same forgiving ear...